Balance on Borderline
by CoffeeCarrot
Summary: SV Blessed with a new life and chance at redemption, Sephiroth is forced to work from the bottom up. Two years in high school can’t be that bad…right? Maybe for a thirtyfive year old soul trapped in a sixteen year old’s body! Second sequel to Diabolic.


Disclaimer: I. Do. Not. Own. Not anything from Square anyway. Just meh OCs.

Haya. I suppose you could call this my first actual fic, but I was too intrigued to pass this up. A second sequel to Diabolic, though under a third author. O.o Credit for Diabolic goes to Ookami Kasumi, an amazing writer really. Though I liked the light-hearted tone that Prelude to Sacrifice, first sequel to Diabolic and written by Sapphire Materia, had in the first three or four chapters that I read, this story will take on a much more serious note and quickly turn into more of an adventure once I have everything set up right.

As far as reviews go, flame, criticize, suggest, complement; it really doesn't matter to me. I'm just writing this for my own amusement. It'll have a few OC's of mine who are important to the plot, but they won't be paired with any of the cannon characters. Ever. If anyone at all. No matter what it seems like.

I was told by Ookami Kasumi that Sephiroth gets his new body a few months before Dirge of Cerberus takes place. Due to obvious ((Or not so obvious)) reasons as to Vincent's past, however, I can't see myself focusing too much on the game besides a possible mention of the WRO, and including the fights Vincent had with all of Deepground. From what I got out of Diabolic, he already knew all that stuff about his past, and had mostly come to terms with it.

A few key points from Diabolic that might clear up a bit of confusion; ((These are spoilers from the story. If you don't want to know and experience the amayzingness of the story for yourself, skip over to where it says 'Chapter One' ))

The ghost of Sephiroth kidnapped Vincent for two reasons. One was that he was in lust/love with our favorite gunman, and the other was that he wanted a new body.

Why would he want a new body? Simple, to kill Jenova once and for all. Just as he survived the dissolution of his consciousness in the life-stream, he believed Jenova would as well, and he had decided that he would be the one to kill her this time.

Okay, so he wants a new body. How's he planning on getting it? Sephiroth needs someone of his actual bloodline, so it seemed he'd defeated himself at his own request. Vincent was given the task anyway, and he eventually started thinking on it for lack of anything better to do. He concluded that, because Hojo was sterile for quite some time after being seen though Vincent's 'third eye' ((Literally, it's the eye of his beast. Placed right on his brow and hidden by his bandana. It can see everything in its basic, elemental matrix in a rainbow of color.)) Hojo was not actually Sephiroth's father. Because he had no way of figuring out who the father was, he turned to the mother. Lucrecia had mentioned to Vincent that her first cousin had gotten her the job as a lab assistant with Professor Gast. Her first cousin had happened to be the grandfather of the current Rufus ShinRa, making Sephiroth both a distant cousin to him, and a ShinRa himself.

Interesting eh?

So, Vincent ended up going into a rage after Sephiroth got himself turned into a ball of Materia by one of the Turks while at the ShinRa mansion in Nibelheim. Vincent kidnapped Rufus, and forced him to share his body with Sephiroth after releasing him for six months. In those six months, they created a clone of Sephiroth by using one of his early blood samples, rendering the active Jenova-taint inert after giving the sixteen-year old body a bath in the same water that cured the Geostigma. Vincent had been working as a Turk under Rufus for those six months, and had fully intended to resign and return to his quiet lifestyle, even though he was deeply in love with Sephiroth by that time. Sephiroth convinced him to stay however, by insisting that he would need a bodyguard. That is where our story will start, three weeks after Sephiroth has his new body.

* * *

)Chapter One(

This had to be one of the most pointless things he had ever been forced into.

Not only pointless, but an insult.

An insult to both him and his childhood tutors. He knew more then most of his teachers -- showed them up every time they thought he wasn't paying attention -- and the 'Physical Education' course was a complete joke to him. He got better experience and training from his nightly spars with Rufus' bodyguards. Otherwise known as the Turks. Speaking of them, even _Reno_ could cook better then any of the cafeteria staff. And that was saying something. Something scary.

So why was he here?

In this shit hole?

Oh yeah…

For a _social_ life.

Well, social _skills_ if you wanted to get more precise.

It still sucked all the same.

Sephiroth skillfully kept the scowl off his face, gold-green eyes staring at the white board up front as frightfully slitted pupils almost lazily scanned the notes written there; not even a fourth of his attention used for listening as their teacher droned on and on about how to find the sum of interior angles of any polygon. You really didn't need that many examples if you understood the formula, which in itself was quite simple.

Three years of high school, maybe a few in collage. The idea hadn't sounded so horrible three weeks ago up in President ShinRa's spacious office. Rufus had made it sound so simple. A 'get in, pass all his classes, make a few friends, get out' sort of deal. He should have put up more of a fight. Sounded easy enough then, though he soon found how difficult it would be for him to make conversation, much less a friend. People weren't too keen on getting close to the look-alike of the man who nearly destroyed their lives. Well…the man who _had_ destroyed their lives. Many of them. Tore quite a few families apart actually. Problem was that hadn't been _him_ in the first place. Not that any of them would care to listen. Not now. Not anymore.

He hadn't intended to reveal himself as the original Sephiroth in the first place, just as he'd told Vincent. They didn't need to know and he didn't want to bother trying to explain himself. Seemed they already had corruption in the corporation though, and simply because the bastard, higher-rank Turk had wanted his bit of glory, he revealed everything to the press. As far as what he knew about Sephiroth being back anyway. Like how they'd cloned him and somehow gotten his soul into it. Needless to say that low-class bastard Turk was now unemployed. Not only had he revealed Sephiroth as once again being among the living, he'd tarnished what small bout of trust the now straight company had earned, seeing as they were ultimately responsible for Sephiroth's return. That, and it was now common knowledge that Sephiroth had inhabited Rufus' body for six months, embarrassing him as well.

So, facing the danger of the planet's wrath-born of fear, he'd been forced into an interview in which he'd tried to explain how he wasn't the same abomination that had tried to take over the planet. He'd told them everything he could from the time of the Nibelheim incident to how he'd gotten where he was now. (He'd been careful to leave out a few points as far as his relationship with Vincent went) It wasn't very convincing, not even to him if he looked at it from their point of view. Truly, he sounded even more insane. No one believed him, and no one would unless they knew what lunacy his entire life had been filled with. None of the world's population did, save the 'friends' he already had at ShinRa.

"_My_ body _was insane." _

It was a poor excuse, and one he wasn't going to waste his time trying to coerce everyone into believing. If they needed proof, they would get it when he killed Jenova. Sure, he could tell them his life's story, but that would further everyone's already horrible opinion on ShinRa, which was counterproductive. He was supposed to be ShinRa's 'role-model ward,' after all.

The general student population tended to avoid him. They were afraid of him, even if he didn't look nearly as intimidating then as he did as an adult. Except for his eyes. So far, only one had chosen to give him a second chance, only one wasn't afraid to approach him. But then again, she wasn't exactly part of the 'general' student population. Just one of those outcasts who never fit in anywhere except with the other outcasts. She was decent enough though.

It wasn't just the student population that was uncomfortable with his return. Some parents had even gone as far as to withdraw their children from such a 'dangerous environment.'

Pftt.

He didn't know weather to be annoyed or grateful for the space everyone gave him. The whole point of him being forced back into tenth grade and the hell called Midgar High --A _public_ high school -- was so that he wouldn't be so isolated…and to learn enough restraint to keep from setting the other kids on fire. Guess they had slight reason to fear him after all. A brief smirk crossed his lips.

"ShinRa!"

Green eyes snapped back to meet hardened brown as an agitated tone cut through his thoughts, effectively de-railing them. Apparently his attentions had shifted, he'd been staring out the window.

"Yes, Mrs. Maytop?"

His voice was deep, far too mature for someone so young. He watched out of his excellent side-vision as a few of his peers shifted uncomfortably, and he scowled slightly. It was like his SOLDIER days again…sort of. Before, they would gawk and stutter every time he spoke to one of them, as if he was incapable of normal speech. And now people were so paranoid that they couldn't stand to hear his voice. Like that alone was going to bring all misfortune down onto their families.

"What is the sum of the interior angles of this polygon?" She was pointing at the shape.

He glanced at the hexagon drawn on the whiteboard, and after some quick multiplication in his head, smoothly answered: "720 degrees, if it was a perfect hexagon." At his teacher's tight nod, Sephiroth returned to nearly ignoring the lesson. He'd learned all this from his private tutors when he was ten. Granted, that was quite a long time ago, epically for a thirty-five year old soul, but a lot of it stuck with him. His memory was just advanced like that. He smirked again.

So what if he was a little arrogant? Vincent complained about it often enough. He loved listening to Vincent insult him on such things. He loved chucking it right back into the man's handsome face.

Attractive.

Sexy…

Sephiroth's eyes became unfocused as his mind left the lesson entirely, drifting off to what his would-be lover had decided to deny him for the next two years. He doubted Valentine would be able to hold out against him for that long. If he could just get the Turk alone in a room long enough to look the doors and corner him…Various ShinRa employees seemed to have developed the annoyingly convenient habit of walking in with the two of them at any given moment. He knew Rufus was having the two of them trailed whenever in the same building. He also figured Vincent had something to do with it. No matter, he would get his beast eventually. For a long time, Sephiroth had been toying with the idea of using his servant's name to get them into a room alone together late at night, but that just took the fun out of it - of taking the time to lure his sexy demon out of his morals, completely destroy his will to hold back, drive him mad with desire just before-

The shrill sound of the bell shattered his pleasant thoughts, slightly darkened eyes darting sharply to the clock his only outward sign of surprise. Oh goodie…lunch.

* * *

"You look irritable." 

Green eyes glanced up and met with the petit form of a conservative eighteen year old. Amused blue-gray eyes and a round face framed by wavy silver tendrils far fluffier then his own sat down across from him, a large plate of food landing on the table in front of her. Lilia Dovall looked at him for a moment longer before taking a bite of her lunch, sweeping a few waist-length, black-tipped strands over her shoulder and out of the way. She seemed to be wearing the usual today -- a pair of black baggy pants; he figured a simple, form-fitting shirt under the extremely baggy, dark-purple sweater and her large black jacket. He watched as she paused in her eating to quickly stuff obscenely long purple sleeves out of sight and out of her way. Sephiroth didn't think he'd ever understand how she could be so comfortable under so many layers, epically in the approaching summer weather.

Those were the only two good things that had come out of this arrangement so far: One was that one person had actually believed his story, or was at least willing to give him a second chance; and the second was that he had started very late into the school year. It would only be another month before he was out for summer break.

"Just thinking." He replied nonchalantly.

Lilia shrugged, smiling at nothing in particular as she took another bite of her food. It was almost gone. She'd probably be getting back in line for something else. Another thing he didn't understand about his somewhat strange friend was where all that food went. At barely five foot, three inches in height, Li looked at least two years younger then she was. Certainly her stomach shouldn't be able to hold so much.

"So, how's your new project going?" He glanced at the simple, yet large paper art portfolio propped up against the table. The fact that she had it with her meant that she had taken it home and needed to work on something. Also meaning that she was behind the rest of the class.

"A little slow…" She took another bite. "It's really annoying. For some reason I can't work on it for more then five minutes at a time before getting out of my chair or just sitting back to stair at something. I'm thinking it's my ADD, but it's not normally this bad." She took the last few bites of her stir-fry. "Maybe it's the still-life I'm using, who knows." She shrugged again before pushing the empty Styrofoam plate off to the side and bringing a hand up to thoughtfully fiddle with the small dragon charm attached to an intricate, cloth-backed silver choker she'd made herself the previous year. Many described it as Gothic. She just called it pretty.

"Hmmm…" Sephiroth took another bite of his sandwich, made in, and brought from home. If he could actually call Rufus' house his home. He would much rather be living on the floor below with Vincent, where he could easily lock the door and no one would be able to save his raven-haired love from the terror that was a hormonal teenager. Eyes growing unfocused again, Sephiroth ran his tongue over his teeth in unconscious anticipation, feeling the slight point in his canines that could only mean his fangs were finally growing in, the body slowly changing to fit his soul. He couldn't feel his wings yet, their absent weight on his shoulders a little un-nerving, but they were existent, their presence a gentle hum at the back of his mind.

His tongue flicked lightly over the points of his fangs again and he swallowed, wishing he could capture that wet muscle between them as he mock-fought it into growling submission. Slick bodies sliding against one another, hips thrusting erratically as Vincent's breathy moans filled the room.

Sephiroth felt his pants tighten as heat pooled in his stomach and started downwards, small smirk spreading across his face.

"You're spacing out again."

Sephiroth's green eyes re-focused, settling sharply on the woman across from him, light smirk gracing her normally innocent-looking features. His gaze narrowed in a mock glare, but she could tell he wasn't truly angry. She had an annoyingly accurate gift for reading the body language of others.

"So you decided to bring me back from such pleasant dreams?"

"I decided to spare you the embarrassment of such thoughts while in a public setting." She stated fatly, looking a little uncomfortable.

"You know I don't give a damn about what others think of me." He returned. "They can shove their ideas." He smirked. "Or let their minds wander. I'm just irresistible like that." He ran a hand though his hair, musing it slightly and giving Lilia a suggestive look. He loved Vincent, and would never betray him, but it was fun to mess with someone so innocent on such matters as physical attraction and attention.

True to her sheltered lifestyle, the senior blushed, glaring at the other and crossing her arms indignantly. "Is that necessary?" She asked irritably. "I really don't think Ryan needs another reason to hate you."

Sephiroth shrugged uninterestedly. "I'm guessing your boyfriend hasn't decided to 'grow up' yet, then?" He asked, quoting a bit of Lilia's sentence back at her. He couldn't understand why she was still with the immature prick, epically after that rant at him. Her relationships weren't any of his business though. He had his own problems to deal with, like surviving without fucking Vincent for the next two years if the man managed to hold out against his advances. He knew he couldn't physically force the other, he wasn't strong enough. Yet. He would get there…maybe he could outsmart him?

"Nope." She replied, breaking into his train of thought again and slouching over to lie against an outstretched arm over the tabletop. Just as the rest of the student population, Ryan Stockholm, a somewhat scrawny junior with shoulder-length, black spiky hair, was frightened of both Sephiroth's 'possible intentions' and sudden return. "He's been complaining that I eat lunch with you, like he expects me to just go back to eating alone when I finally have some company." Before Sephiroth had turned up, Lilia had been the only one of her friends to have this lunch. And because she was just quiet like that, she hadn't tried too hard to make any new friends for her own entertainment. Listening to music or doodling in her sketch book had been good enough for her.

"Sounds like he doesn't have much trust in you."

"I think it's more along the lines of not trusting _you_."

Sephiroth snorted and rolled his eyes. Lilia smiled.

The bell signaling the end of lunch could barely be heard over the chatter of the noisy cafeteria, and Lilia shot up, her back straight and a look of dismay on her face.

"What?"

"I forgot I was still hungry!"

It took a moment for Sephiroth to start laughing as he stood from the bench.

Lilia just scowled at him.

* * *

Well, there's the first chapter. Hope it's satisfactory, still sounds a bit choppy to me. But I'm tired of messing with it. I've started the second chapter, but it still might take a little while for me to get it out. 

With much luffOkra


End file.
